111–120 of 131 posts
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Is there a scientific consensus (or at least majority) as to the carcinogenic effect of the Roundup product?
There isn't. Glyphosate is well studied, and all evidence exonerate it. The constituent chemicals of Roundup may interact with each other to render the cocktail toxic. But that's not equivalent to carcinogenicity. And it's not well studied as yet.
I don't know what Monsanto did or didn't do and don't have any particular rooting interest for Monsanto, but I think it's worth noting that the published science for the carcinogenicity of glyphosate (the "weed killer" we're talking about here) is extremely flimsy. Most publicity about "cancer" and "Monsanto" is traceable back to an IARC report that the World Health Organization (IARC's parent) essentially retracted.…
The real point is that it is not glyphosate we're talking about, it's roundup. And it would appear that the cocktail of whatever makes up roundup may not be fine. So please address that, not glyphosate.
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There isn't. Glyphosate is well studied, and all evidence exonerate it. The constituent chemicals of Roundup may interact with each other to render the cocktail toxic. But that's not equivalent to carcinogenicity. And it's not well studied as yet.
>Glyphosate is well studied, No. That is false. https://ehjournal.biomedcentral.com/articles/10.1186/s12940-... The studies on glyphosate are plenty, but most are inadequate.
The only answer I have so far is that we need to fund our research institutes better to get more studies faster. I do appreciate though that glyphosate has replaced many less safe herbicides.
I think even going off of the WHO FAQ, the comparison of the situation to one the tobacco industry faced is not the correct one.
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The point wasn't how long it would take for the organism to gestate, it was how long it would take for the trait to be introduced into the organism. We can do that precisely for fluorescence and many other traits with GM today, but good luck trying to breed a fluorescent horse, it could take millions of years if at all.
There is no reliable or efficient vector to introduce fluoresence to somatic cells in a horse-sized animal, so no, 1 month is still way too short. You seem to have a highly romanticised idea about the capability of GM but it is misguided. Besides, GFP fluoresence is the proverbial low hanging fruit as it is robustly expressed in many cell types but has very little practical value. Inserting useful traits via GM is of…
Your point about multiple genes is a very good one but we have a good understanding of how some gene networks work already and the rest will follow.
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There is no reliable or efficient vector to introduce fluoresence to somatic cells in a horse-sized animal, so no, 1 month is still way too short. You seem to have a highly romanticised idea about the capability of GM but it is misguided. Besides, GFP fluoresence is the proverbial low hanging fruit as it is robustly expressed in many cell types but has very little practical value. Inserting useful traits via GM is of…
the point isn't about actually growing an adult fluorescent horse, it's about proving the principle in an embryo - which takes days. It's already been done with mice, but I agree it's a simple example. Your point about multiple genes is a very good one but we have a good understanding of how some gene networks work already and the rest will follow.
I'd say that our ability to interact with the genome is still rather crude, else we'd have already cured cancer by now - we already have a pretty good understanding of the cellular biology of cancer but it only helps us so much.
Who actually likes Monstanto? I imagine a vast majority of the American people would support an outright shutdown of their business.
Luckily we still have the rule of law, so the majority can't simply shut down a company they dislike based on an internet misinformation campaign.
Who actually likes Monstanto? I imagine a vast majority of the American people would support an outright shutdown of their business.
Luckily we still have the rule of law, so the majority can't simply shut down a company they dislike based on an internet misinformation campaign.
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Science is a process and is close to an infallible thing as we have created as humans. There is no problem with science. What is happening here is "lying". The people creating false and misleading scientific results are liars and it becomes a question of taking skeptical views towards sources and knowing who to trust.
> Science is a process and is close to an infallible thing as we have created as humans. There is no problem with science. Wouldn't you say mathmatics is the most infallible thing human's have come to creating? The level of rigor in mathematics is much higher and there aren't as many repeatability issues.
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Totally fair point! I'm only familiar with the Internet era of Monsanto complaints. I'm sure Monsanto is not a great company.
The question I have for you, is why do you always pop up to defend Monsanto, no matter what, every single time? Its so obvious you are a supporter of the company, because every single time there is the word "Monsanto" on the HN front page, I can come to the article and search "tptacek" and see you defending the company, diverting the discussion, using a whole suite of tactics to avoid letting anyone make the conclusi…
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Regarding that Senneff cite: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=9281240
Two ad hominems. Here's a possibility. The scientific social networks consist of people who's research is paid for by the same corporations/government agencies with inherent conflicts of interest.